ELECTRIC FURNACES? GAS FURNACES? WHICH ONE IS BETTER FOR MY HOUSE?

Winter Is Upon The McKinney, TX Area.

Now that the weather has turned colder and winter is on the horizon, we are looking forward to huddling around the fireplace and turning on our furnaces at home. Most of the weather in McKinney is Pleasant in the winter time but the past 2 years have been very rough weather for the winter. It is always a good idea in the fall to make sure your furnace is operational and safe for The Long Winter ahead. Read ahead to find out all you need to know about the differences between gas and electric furnaces. Usually if your furnace is going bad and you need to replace it you are not going to switch from gas to electric or vice versa. Alternatively if you are adding square footage to your home or building a new one you would consider the difference between an electric furnace and a gas furnace. This post will include information about both furnace types to better inform you.

 

First up we'll go over cost. The cost of electric furnaces usually is much less for initial installation and cost of the equipment. On the other hand gas furnaces tend to Cost Less to run. Like I mentioned before if your home is already set up with a gas furnace or an electric furnace this may not affect you much main cost we are talking about are utilities that must be installed in a new construction application. In other words from scratch the gas furnace cost more then the electric furnace to get installed and set up in a new construction situation. Your home may already be set up like I said for one or the other furnace type and this is going to be the most affordable route when replacing existing air conditioning and heating equipment. With that said electric furnaces can be coupled with heat pump units to rival the efficiency of heating your home. It is still more efficient to use a gas furnace but nowhere near the cost of electric heat only. Electric heat strips operate at almost three times the amount of electricity needed to run your heat pump. A heat pump air conditioning unit can run air conditioning mode to cool your house in the summer and reverse to run heat mode to heat your house in the winter. This has nothing to do with your electric furnace or gas furnace this is strictly a function of the outdoor air conditioning unit.

 

Another consideration might be the potential life you would get out of each unit type. With regular maintenance gas furnaces May last up to 20 years or more. Parts may need to be changed but all in all gas furnaces are fairly sturdy pieces of equipment. Electric furnaces May last longer being that they are mostly made up of an electric heat strip and a fan motor. With that said most electric furnaces are now coupled with the air conditioning coil for inside or the evaporator coil in other words. This combination is called an electric air handler this is considerably more expensive and is usually the first component of your system to wear out from corrosion or normal use. This will change the life expectancy of the unit considerably. In this case the air handler is most certainly the weakest link in your air conditioning and heating system mainly due to the fact that when summer comes around if you're evaporator coil is not functioning you will not have air conditioning in your home.

 

Some homeowners like to feel safe knowing that their furnace does not make carbon monoxide, thus keeping the potential for a leak into their home nonexistent. This level of comfort can be found with an electric furnace. Not all homeowners are worried about this but it is another potential down side of a gas furnace. The spent exhaust gas must exit the home with certain regulations adhered to in order to keep all occupants safe. With the fuel source being an electric heat kit you would not have this problem because the electric furnace does not make carbon monoxide as a by product of using fuel.

Check with your Builder or local air conditioning and heating company to determine whether or not you should be using a gas furnace or electric furnace in your home. Take into account the possibility that with solar panels and electric heater system May cost more in theory but you are not paying as much for electricity as others. Other considerations like potential Savings of utilities that need to be upgraded or changed in order to switch from one furnace type to the other. These different options or problems would have to be weighed on an individual basis depending on your short-term and long-term goals on the project.

McKinney High Efficiency Air Conditioning Repair Basics

 

About High Efficiency Air Conditioning Repair In Texas

In 1914 carrier installed the first residential air conditioning system at a mansion in Minneapolis. Before this system was installed, which was huge about 7 Ft. tall and 20 Ft. wide, the only air conditioning systems were in industrial use and hospitals. It wasn't until later in the late 20s and 30s that air conditioning units became more readily available for residential use. After that it was quickly made available and affordable enough for every household to have the opportunity to get an air conditioning unit. Since then air conditioning and heating installation and repair has come a long way. Finding ourselves in the most efficient air conditioning and heating error of our time, we can only go up from here. With more and more complex air conditioning systems being installed, especially in Texas, it is more and more important for you to have a reliable professional air conditioning repair company available 24/7 to make sure your system does not stay broken long. Technicians nowadays have a few extra hurdles to deal with when beginning and air conditioning repair on high efficiency equipment. The most common difference between a standard AC system and the top of the line model is variable speed motors. The variable speed motor allows the unit to run at different capacities, which by itself increases your potential for electricity savings to an almost unknown number. Now when we say unknown what we are really talking about is the fact that depending on certain circumstances in your home this unit may be more efficient at your house than it would be at another.

 

What is the difference between a standard fan motor and a variable speed fan motor. The most notable difference is that the variable speed fan motor may run at 1200 different speeds or more, while your standard fan motors will only have four speeds and only utilize two of them at a time. The standard fan motor will run high speed for cool and medium high for heat under most circumstances. When the fan is called by itself the medium high speed will be engaged without the furnace turning on the heat. The variable speed fan motor not only has different speeds that it can run at when it's at Max Capacity but it will also ramp up the speed from a dead stop very slowly. A standard fan motor will jolt on at full speed, the variable speed motor prevents normal wear and tear by ramping up and down turning itself on and off. Imagine that it takes 90 seconds to go from a dead stop to a full speed that is basically what your variable speed motor is doing.

 

Another Factor When comparing standard fan motors to variable speed is the quantity of air they will move versus electricity being used. In basic terminology your air conditioning unit needs air to transfer the heat from the house into the air conditioning system. The more air your indoor system moves the more efficient your air conditioner will be. Installing a variable speed indoor unit automatically increases your Seer rating on the air conditioning system 0.5. This might be negligible but when we are talking about government rebates and local and utility credits or rebates they will require minimum standards that will need to be met. You will have to gauge the cost difference between the most expensive air conditioning system and possibly a unit in the middle with a variable speed indoor unit matching it. This type of unit matchup is extremely common when trying to achieve high efficiency or minimum standards for tax rebates. These tax rebates usually apply to installing air conditioning systems new, in other words upgrading your current AC system to a more efficient one is what they are looking for. And some cities states and sometimes the federal government and the utility companies will all have potential rebates at some point in time.

 

With maximum air flow control and precision quantity of air flow to match cooling or heating needs, this is not the only benefit we get from variable speed units. Anytime we have a variable speed unit we are automatically able to influence and control the humidity inside of your home better than with a standard fan motor. This means in the summertime we're trying to remove humidity from the house, and in the winter time we want to make sure and leave as much as we can and if we need to use humidifiers to put more in. Whole home humidifiers are available and extremely efficient with new technology pumping steam into your ductwork for maximum humidity control. With variable speed air conditioning and heating systems humidity will no longer be a problem in your home. Wood floor manufacturers recommend your humidity to stay right around 40% give or take 5 or 10%. This will maximize the lifespan of your wood flooring and maintain its beauty. During the summer time the air conditioning system will remove humidity from the air that it cools on a regular basis anywhere from 5 to 15 gallons of water a day will be generated by a normal air conditioning system. In the winter time as we expand the air inside the house by heating it up we reduce the quantity of air inside. When we do that we are not changing the ratio of air to water which is our relative humidity. So when we remove air we also remove water from the house just like a lot of things when air heats up it expands thus pushing itself out of your home. This removal of air is a removal of water in the air and most of the time if you are running the heater up consistently you will need a humidifier. Humidifiers help replace the moisture you have taken out of the air and maintain a minimum of 35 or 40% relative humidity.

 

Next time you're in the market for an air conditioning and heating system weigh the possibility of replacing your system with a variable speed air conditioning and heating system. The best time to upgrade to a variable speed unit is when you are installing a new system it may be considerably more than your Standard Builders grade model. When you look at the difference between upgrading your air conditioning system don't just think of the utility savings also remember your comfort level inside and indoor air quality.